Jared Max: Cam Newton Reminds Me 'Life Is A Vacation'
By Jared Max
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Have you ever been on a vacation and fallen deeply in love — with another person, a local culture or mentality — to a degree that you believed you had seen a light that had changed your life's outlook?
Two years ago I was nearly killed in a car accident.
In a most unlikely setting — Route 4 in Fort Lee, New Jersey, a busy highway within one mile of the George Washington Bridge, headed to dinner on a Friday night — a large deer appeared ahead to my left. From 10:30 in my field of vision, it galloped frantically, diagonally across the westbound lanes and over the divider like a heat-seeking missile headed for my car driving 60 miles per hour toward New York.
Instantaneously, my brain processed critical danger. First, it felt surreal. "Deer don't come around these parts." Then, I reacted. Still unsure what I did, I believe I jerked the wheel to the left, ever-slightly, a moment before impact. The adjustment may have saved my life. Instead of hitting my low-to-the-ground Volkswagen GTI head-on, the deer met me at the left corner of the car's front end. An inch or two left or right, he'd have then flown through my windshield or bulldozed into my driver's side door. Instead, the science of the collision kept this accident a single fatality. The seatbelt did its job, too.
I survived. So did my car. Its damage was mostly external, financially covered by insurance as an "Act of God." The effects on me were internal. Relatively temporary, too. Now, sometimes I wish I still felt as I did after that night I cheated death.
I imagine Cam Newton will, too.
After the Carolina Panthers quarterback returned home Tuesday from his precautionary overnight hospital stay, he posted a lengthy message on Instagram. An epiphany. Twenty-four hours before, Newton could have been killed. Hit by another vehicle that had driven through a stop sign, Cam's truck flipped at least three times.
Because he was wearing his seat belt (and, maybe an "Act of God") he was given the opportunity to share his near-death experience:
As I read Newton's post I became aware that as common as near-death experiences are, the reactions by those thrust into situations that made them believe they were going to die is equally standard.
Like Newton did, I shared my newfound thoughts along with photos of my vehicular carnage on social media the day after my accident. On Facebook, I wrote:
Two years since my near-death experience, I wish that I felt as connected to the essence of life as I did in the hours and days that followed the accident. But I carry some of it. Still, I believe there is probably a tradeoff — that the euphoria wore off as my driving fears subsided. While I was aware that I did not feel as spiritual, I was grateful to not be on a paranoid level of high alert for deer while driving every day and night.
While I wish Newton the best of luck in maintaining his newborn sense of vitality, I wonder if natural causes and effects could recharge his NFL career. Might he be reborn, rooted in fearlessness? Seems to me that professional football provides a similar rush that adrenaline junkies seek, thirsting to recapture life's greatest zest — daring it from the precipice of death.
People have been trying to capture lighting in a bottle since before souvenir shops sold tin cans packaging "Florida Sunshine." You can't take paradise with you.
Or, as a former boss wisely told me, "In this business, you don't get to keep your jobs. You only get to borrow them."
Jared Max is a multi-award winning sportscaster. He hosted a No. 1 rated New York City sports talk show, "Maxed Out" — in addition to previously serving as longtime Sports Director at WCBS 880, where he currently anchors weekend sports. Follow and communicate with Jared on Twitter @jared_max.
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